For years, the stretch of Glenview Road between the Metra tracks and Waukegan felt like a place you drove through on the way to dinner somewhere else. That is no longer true, and the shift happened faster than most residents give it credit for.
If you live here, you have probably noticed the new signage, the valet stand at the old filling station, the line at the coffee shop across from the train. What is easier to miss is the shape of the change underneath. The Village of Glenview did not wait for the market to sort itself out. It put grant money, parking, and a preserved 1899 building on the table, and a specific lineup of operators showed up to take it. That is why the new Downtown reads as a district rather than a scattered set of openings, and why it is likely to still be here in five years.
Here is what actually opened, what is coming, and how to reorganize a weekend around it.
The lineup, in order of arrival
Two Ballyhoo Hospitality concepts anchor the north end. Jackman & Co. opened in the summer, and Zenzi Den followed as the group's modern izakaya, with a binchotan robata grill and a shoji-screened Tatami Room set beyond the sushi counter for smaller gatherings. It is the closest thing Downtown has to a room designed for a long dinner rather than a quick one.
Across from the Metra station at 1869 Grove Street, Hometown Coffee & Juice now occupies a space that used to be an industrial building. The chain has locations in Glencoe, Lake Forest, and Winnetka, and the Glenview outpost is the one you can actually walk to from the platform.
At the corner of Waukegan and Grove, Ovvio Italian Taverna took the site of a former filling station and turned it into a full-service Italian room. The Glenview Chamber of Commerce cut the ribbon on December 1, and the operator, Nick Philippas, also runs North Branch Pizza and Burger Company and Joe Donut Café, so the kitchen is not learning on the job.
What is landing next
| Concept | Address | Status |
|---|---|---|
| The Foxtail at Glen View House | 1843 Glenview Rd | Opening late summer, third location of the Mediterranean concept |
| Spiro's Deli | NE corner of Glenview Rd & Lehigh Ave | Relocating from 1210 Waukegan Rd, hours extending to 9 a.m.–9 p.m. |
| Smoque BBQ | 1131 Waukegan Rd | Construction beginning in 2026 |
Spiro's is the one to watch if you have lived here a while. It has been a Glenview staple since 1962, and it has held its Waukegan address for the last thirty years. The move is short in distance and long in meaning. The Bomber, the chicken pita, the Italian beef, the poor boys, and the gyros survive the trip, and evening hours now stretch to 9 p.m., which is new for a deli that used to close in the afternoon.
Smoque BBQ is the outlier and worth the wait. Its Old Irving Park original has been on national best-of-BBQ lists since 2006, and Glenview has never had anything close to it.
The 1899 building the Village refused to lose
The Glen View House at 1843 Glenview Road is where the Village's charter was adopted and signed in 1899. It could have been quietly demolished for a bigger footprint. Instead, the Village put a $1.4 million grant and a $1.5 million loan on the table to rehab the building, updating the kitchen and dining areas while keeping the historic exterior and name. The Foxtail signed on as the operator and is preserving both.
This is the part of the story that will not appear on a menu. The Village also handed Hometown Coffee & Juice and its property owner a $500,000 grant to demolish an industrial building and add surface parking and outdoor dining. If you have wondered why several new restaurants opened within a few blocks of each other rather than scattering across Glenview, this is the reason. Downtown revitalization here is not a market accident. It is an underwritten strategy that came out of the Glenview Connect process and the Downtown Strategic Plan the Village Board adopted in August 2021.
"There is so much momentum in our Downtown right now," Village President Michael Jenny said when the Board approved the Hometown and Foxtail agreements in August 2024. "More activation in the Downtown benefits everyone."
The parking change that tells you the Village means it
If you have ever circled the block on a Friday night looking for a space, this is the section for you. The former Patio Shops site at Glenview Road and River Drive has been rebuilt as a 60-stall public lot, open all day on weekdays, weekends, and holidays. A new shared agreement with Colonial Court at 1775 Glenview Road opens up another 70 spaces during evenings and weekends, when the office tenants are gone. The commuter lot west of Depot and north of Grove is being reconstructed to add roughly twenty more spaces, along with sidewalks, lighting, and stormwater upgrades.
Roughly 150 new evening and weekend spaces within a few blocks is not a headline number, but it is the difference between wanting to try Ovvio on a Saturday and actually doing it.
A Saturday, reorganized
For anyone who has been running the same weekend loop for years, here is a version that uses what is now open:
- 8 a.m. to noon, drop by the Glenview Farmers Market at Historic Wagner Farm (1510 Wagner Road). It runs Saturdays June 20 through October 24, and vendors source within 200 miles of Glenview. If you use a LINK card, the market matches SNAP dollars up to $25 per market for fruits and vegetables, which is worth telling neighbors who might not know.
- Mid-morning, coffee and a pastry at Hometown Coffee & Juice on Grove, five minutes from the market.
- Afternoon, a walk through The Grove, the 123-acre National Historic Landmark on Milwaukee Avenue that includes the Kennicott House, the Redfield Estate, and the interpretive center. Free and rarely crowded.
- Evening, dinner at Ovvio or Zenzi Den, then live music at Gallery Park, which has run a weekly summer band series with a rotating Chicago lineup.
Mark September 26 on the calendar. The Village's downtown celebration that night brings live music, food, and beverages to the district, and it is the single best evening for a resident to see how much the streetscape has changed in two years.
One plan when your in-laws visit
Skip the drive into the city. Start with coffee at Hometown, then Wagner Farm if it is a Saturday morning, then either The Glen Club for a look at Tom Fazio's course on the old Naval Air Station grounds or a walk through The Grove. Dinner at The Foxtail once it opens, or Ovvio if it has not yet. Everyone tells you Chicago is thirty minutes away. The point of the last two years is that on many nights, you no longer need to make the trip.
Why this matters if you own here
None of this is a pitch to move. You already did. What it means for a homeowner is quieter and longer term. Walkable dinner districts tend to hold value in a way that pass-through strips do not, and Glenview now has one where it did not before. The specific tell is not any single restaurant. It is that the Village put grants, parking, and a preserved historic building behind the plan, and that the operators who signed on are the ones with track records in Chicago and on the North Shore. That combination is unusual, and it is the reason the change looks structural rather than seasonal.
If you are thinking about what your home is worth in this new version of Downtown, or you have a friend asking whether Glenview is finally worth a look, Payes Real Estate Group works across Glenview and the surrounding North Shore and Lake County communities and would be glad to talk. Work With Us when you are ready.
